Lakewood family struggles to bring mother's body back

May 8, 2014

Updated May 9, 2014 1:15 p.m.

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Anna Marie Cruz and her younger sister, Amanda, hold a photograph of their mother, who died while traveling overseas in South Korea. The Cruz family started an online fundraiser to retrieve the mother's body from the Korean hospital that refused to release her until her bills were paid. JOSH MORGAN, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

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Anna Marie Cruz's face is reflected back at her as she looks at an image of her mother, who died last month. JOSH MORGAN, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

Anna Marie Cruz and her younger sister, Amanda, hold a photograph of their mother, who died while traveling overseas in South Korea. The Cruz family started an online fundraiser to retrieve the mother's body from the Korean hospital that refused to release her until her bills were paid. JOSH MORGAN, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

How to donate

What: The Cruz family has to raise $157,000 to pay for its late mother's hospitalization bills.

Anna Marie Cruz said she has a very good reason to celebrate Mother’s Day this year. Her mom gets to come home.

Constancia Cruz, who died in South Korea in April, will be flown home this weekend for a proper celebration of life.

But getting her back wasn’t easy.

Constancia Cruz died of septic shock, a condition that impacts vital organs, on April 28 while traveling back to her Lakewood home with her husband, Pedro Cruz, 74, after visiting their native Philippines. On a layover in Seoul, South Korea, she collapsed at the airport.

She received treatment at two South Korean hospitals for 76 days before she died at the age of 70, her daughter said.

After initially paying $90,000 in hospital fees, the family was notified that it had an additional $157,000 to pay before the hospital would release the body.

The mom had full-coverage life insurance, her daughter said, but she didn’t have travel insurance.

“We just didn’t even know what the circumstances were with emergency hospitalization outside the country,” said Anna Marie Cruz, 35, of North Hollywood. “As a family, we really had to discuss what our options were and if we should consider leaving her there until we figured out the billing situation. But my dad really wanted to take her home.”

The U.S. Embassy said the matter was out of its hands.

“They said it’s more common than we think that people are left in these foreign hospitals because they can’t afford the bill,” Anna Marie Cruz said.

Anna Marie Cruz and her five siblings decided to set up a GoFundMe online donation page to try to raise funds to bring their mother home.

Since setting up the account on April 28, they’ve already raised $55,694 as of Thursday afternoon, enough to impress the hospital to release Constancia Cruz.

“My sister was like, ‘There’s this many people in Los Angeles alone. What if we could reach 157,000 people and get one dollar donated from each one of them?’” said Anna Marie Cruz, who has taken charge of the page. “My sister showed the hospital, and at first, I was a little upset like, ‘Why would you show this to our enemy?’ But it ended up working out in our favor because they’ve been seeing the momentum and that people want to bring my mom home.”

The family is still working to raise the rest of the money but said it is grateful the hospital allowed it to take the mother home early.

Anna Marie Cruz said the amount of support she has received so far has been overwhelming.

“It’s so weird to feel what you’re supposed to feel in mourning and grief when you see all the support and just feel everyone wanting the same thing you want,” she said. “I just envision 600 people around me right now, supporting me and telling me to keep going. It’s been a roller coaster of emotions from the start, but there’s also been this incredible opportunity to talk about my mom.”

Anna Marie Cruz said her mother, a retired teacher who taught in the Philippines, was deserving of the recognition because of how hard she worked for her family.

“She was always so selfless, and I thought she really deserved that kind of platform that she never had for herself,” she said.

Anna Marie said it’s a lesson on the importance of having travel insurance, especially for seniors.

“We have a growing retirement community that is using their retirement income for the last 20 years of their lives,” she said. “It’s an important thing to highlight that if you are traveling, you need to look at what kind of insurance you have. You also have to think about, as someone who’s caring for an elderly, what are these other decisions (when seniors travel abroad)? It’s not so black and white.”

Marie Montgomery, spokeswoman for the Automobile Club of Southern California, emphasized the importance of travel insurance.

She said it can help with things like illness out of the country, death out of the country, emergencies that would result in the canceling of trips and natural disasters while traveling. It generally costs about 10 percent of the total cost of a trip, she said.

“It’s not going to cover 100 percent of all situations, but in most situations you’re going to be happy to have it,” Montgomery said.

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